INTERVIEW / A day in the life of…Rhinocrunch

If you play Fortnite and you’ve been watching videos on Youtube, you’ll almost certainly know this guy. With nearly 1m subscribers and 100s of videos, Rhinocrunch is a popular Youtube gamer.

I had a chat with him to get the inside track on what it’s like to be a gaming Youtuber.

So, hey there Mr Rhino CRUNCH (inside joke on his video intros)!!!, been watching your gaming videos on Youtube for some time, how did you get into doing them?

Hey dude, I got into making Youtube videos when I was in college. I watched a lot of Seanners and Toby Turner back in the day and saw there wasn’t really a large Battlefield Youtube community aside from Pixel Enemy. They were like the first channel I really got inspired to make videos similar to. They had this really great “How Not to Be a Noob” in a Battlefield Bad Company 2 video they did and that’s what really opened my eyes to what’s possible on Youtube. I didn’t so much want to be a Let’s Player but more of like a guide channel or tips & tricks channel.

Awesome! So, how much editing and sorting goes into making a video? We as viewers get to see maybe 20-30 minutes of gaming from you but is there more going on behind the scenes?

Currently, I spend a few hours every morning playing and recording. I try to pick the best game of the day for an upload. I spend another couple of hours post producing the audio, intro & outro, then get it ready for publish. I also spend another hour or so on the title and thumbnail then another half hour of publishing. This is the description, tagging, sorting, etc. This is abnormal for me though because a few months ago I wasn’t doing daily uploads. Sometimes, I would take a week to publish a video and spend upwards of 40 hours editing. Videos where I really tried to push the boundaries of storytelling and gameplay. I discovered, however, videos like that are a bit too artsy for Youtube and people just want to see some daily content no matter how much effort goes into the editing.

Sounds like a lot of work. So, take me through a day in the life of a Youtube gamer?

So, I wake up at 5 AM and check my Youtube analytics. I see how the videos are doing, read through as much as the comments as I can then I try to answer my fan mail. This is something Mr. Rogers did, he personally hand wrote and responded to all his fan mail which I greatly admire. I will then go to the gym and run a couple of miles. I really believe that exercise makes you a better player. I feel so off if I haven’t worked out for the week. After that, I come home and get warmed up in game by playing hard mode or solo squads in Fortnite. Once I am confident with my aim and reaction, I will hop into some solos and try to get some interesting / fun wins. Around then it is about lunchtime, so I take a break and get ready to edit. I then spend the better part of the rest of the day getting tomorrow’s video out. For the most part, the wins are a day late so people are watching videos I recorded from the previous day. Some days though if it is an update and they are adding some interesting mechanics or items to the game, I will speed the whole process up and get the video out before noon. I publish videos everyday at 12PM so it is a rush on update days to get the video published.

And finally, Fortnite. I myself am addicted to this game. I normally play squads and duos but I’m looking for that elusive first solo win. My normal strategy is to head somewhere quiet, loot what I can and then hide in bushes stalking the circle zone until the final 5, then go on the attack. I’m not great on 1:1 situations and that’s usually why I die before getting any further. What tips would you give someone like me who knows he needs to get better in shooting situations but just can’t seem to fire quickly enough.

So, Fortnite is an interesting game because it combines elements from so many games in the genre. The best advice I could give someone who hasn’t gotten their solo win yet is to really get good at map navigation. You are going to want to think ahead of the circle and constantly be putting yourself in a position that is advantageous to the situation. This means pushing early and knowing where to build & push. Some other tips for general shooting mechanics I can give is to just practice.

I have literally tens of thousands of hours in shooters so I have grown accustomed to adapting to new games quickly but sometimes people just need to close the experience gap. Finally, I believe that since there is so much RNG involved within Fortnite, it just will take a little bit of luck for that win. Play long enough and you will get the double shield & gold scar from a chest and be in position for an easy win for the rest of the game. One more thing, a little help from Jesus never hurt either, God bless those reading this!

So, there you have it, a day in the life of a Youtuber like Rhinocrunch. I was kinda surprised at how much time was taken for a relatively short video but when you watch his videos, it does come across that he really cares.

I’ll leave you with a video of his I’ve watched a few times, where he builds a sniper tower!

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